Different Types of Dressing Table Mirrors
People ask us for a dressing table mirror and mean about six different things. One customer wants bulbs around the edge like a film set. Another wants something they can tilt on a table. A third wants a mirror tall enough to check the whole outfit before leaving.
They are all dressing table mirrors. They do different jobs. Here is what each is actually good at, and the one mistake we see more than any other.
The wall-mounted rectangle or oval
The default, and usually the right answer. A rectangle or oval fixed to the wall above the table, 24×30 inches for a standard table or 18×24 for a compact one.
It keeps the table surface clear, which matters more than people expect once brushes and bottles start accumulating. If your table sits against a narrow wall, turn the rectangle vertical. It uses the space better than a wide mirror and still shows head and shoulders.
Tri-fold mirrors
Three hinged panels you can angle inward. The point of them is seeing the sides of your own head, which a flat mirror will never show you. Useful if you do your own hair.
The trade-off is depth. Folded out, a tri-fold eats a good six inches of table. Folded in, it stores flat, so it suits a small room better than its size suggests.
Hollywood mirrors, with the bulbs
Look at the picture below and count where the light is coming from. Not one strip along the top, but eight or ten separate points spread around the glass.
That spread is the entire reason makeup artists use them. Light arriving from several directions fills the shadows under the brow, nose and chin instead of deepening them. A single strip along the top does the opposite.
If the mirror is mainly for makeup, this is the most useful one in the range. The bulbs are LED rather than true incandescent, so they run cool and replace individually.
Tabletop mirrors
Small, tilting, stands on the table. The advantage is that you can carry it to the window, which on a bright afternoon beats any electric light ever made.
Not a main mirror. Think of it as the one you own alongside the main one, for close work or for the days you get ready somewhere else in the house.
Shaped and frameless mirrors
Frameless and organic shapes have taken over Indian bedrooms in the last few years, and for a reason worth saying out loud. Nearly every other surface in the room is a rectangle. The wardrobe, the bed, the window, the room itself. One curved thing on the wall does a lot of work.
The catch is that an irregular edge gives you less usable reflection than its size suggests. Size up slightly from what looks right.
A full-length mirror beside the table
Not strictly a dressing table mirror, but the pairing most of our customers end up with. You sit for your face and stand for the outfit. Doing both at one mirror means constantly getting up and backing away.
A tall mirror leaning against the wall next to the table solves it. Anchor the top if there are children or pets in the house.
The mistake almost everyone makes
Height. Nearly every dressing table mirror we see in photographs is hung too high, at standing eye level, because that is where mirrors normally go.
You do not stand at a dressing table. You sit. Hung high, the light comes down at an angle and puts the shadows straight back under your eyes, which is the exact problem the mirror was bought to solve.
Set the centre of the glass at seated eye level. For most people at a standard table that is somewhere around 42 to 48 inches from the floor. Sit down, look straight ahead, mark the wall.
So which one
If you mostly do makeup, buy bulbs or a front-lit mirror and get the height right. If the table is mainly for jewellery and a quick check, a wall-mounted rectangle is plenty. If the room is small, a shaped mirror will do more for it than a large plain one.
Whatever you pick, look for CRI 90 or above in the lighting. Below that, colours shift, and makeup matched at the mirror reads wrong the moment you step outside.
We cut every one of these to size in Delhi, from 6 inches to 120, with a 5-year warranty on the lighting as well as the glass. If you are unsure what fits your table, message us a photo of the wall and we will tell you.
See our dressing table mirrors